That actually IS ownership. EULAs are not worth the paper they're printed on. Don't assume that they actually mean anything in the vast majority of cases.
I don't care if you don't want to release your source. That's fine. Enjoy.
But you have not earned a copyright on the binary in that case. Because the binary isn't as useful to the public (inclusive of all other developers) as the binary + source is. Or as a book, or a movie is.
Copyright was predicated on the assumption that all creative works would be as useful in their released form as a book, map, song, painting, etc. was back in 1789.
Software presently breaks that. Thus, because the public isn't benefitting as much as we expected to, we shouldn't be granting a copyright to you until you have earned it.
If a good portion of my site's readers start using blocking software, I could not afford to keep my site going the way it is now. And why, exactly, would that be a good thing?
Well, I hate all advertising, and I go to great lengths to block out as much as I possibly can. On the computer it's extremely rare for me to see any ads at this point. (maybe some spam in Pine, but I'm going to get the admin to upgrade to a newer version that will help me out a lot on that frong)
So, if I think it's a bad thing to see ads, and I think it's a bad thing to not see your site, on the whole, I'd probably rather not have the ads. Or at least they'd be equal, so asking me to give up one is certainly no great benefit for me.
I don't care if you stay in business. Lots of businesspeople fail every day. I liked Kozmo, and look what happened to them. Advertising may turn out to be a dumb way to run a business. If you fail to find a better alternative, then some competitor of yours assuredly will and will run you into the ground. It behooves you to try your damnest to appease customers.
Given how little benefit I derive from your getting ad revenue, even were I a regular reader of the site, I don't see why I should be shedding tears if you can't get it.
What's in it for me? You want ads because you want money -- you're not altruistic. Why should I be?
The sole objective of copyright is to promote the progress of the arts. This is best done by making sure that there are many works in the public domain, which may be used as is, copied, altered, and redistributed.
The method by which we accomplish this is to set up the copyright system, but it is just a means to an end.
However, compiled binaries cannot be meaningfully modified. And they run the risk of being unable to be used, copied, or redistributed if various copy protection measures are implemented.
If the public is not receiving that benefit from those works, then why should they be giving anything in exchange for them? Copyrights are only given, after all, in expectation for full rights to the entire work in the end.
Source is essentially the work. It's what's needed to make changes to (and maybe even copy or use) software without unreasonable amounts of effort demanded from the public.
As for contract -- you're just an idiot. Contract only effects people who have privity. If you write a program, and I obtain a copy of it WITHOUT signing your contract, and it's not copyrighted, you're just royally screwed.
Your position is as absurd as saying that we can use contracts to replace tort law or something. You really just don't understand how things work.
Softman Prod. v. Adobe Sys., 171 F. Supp. 2d 1075 (C.D. Cal. 2001). Note the language on 1083-84, 1088, 1091. As the court notes, it doesn't reach the issue... but the message is clear.
Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Strauss, 210 U.S. 339 (1908).
The latter is noteworthy for creating the First Sale doctrine directly out of the copyright clause; it was not codified by Congress until the next year.
How is Villanova, incidentally? I'm across the river at Rutgers Law. (and not studying my ass off enough, as posting on/. would seem to indicate;)
Not being the originator of something isn't enough to hang your argument on. Disney didn't originate the plots or characters in the vast majority of their movies, nor did they pay to use them. See, e.g. the just-now-being-released 'Treasure Planet,' based upon the R.L. Stevenson novel 'Treasure Island.'
Thus, they're gallavanting around with ill-gotten stories that weren't produced by them.
I have no problem with them doing that -- but if you're going to allow it, you'll have to find a different line of argument. There is one, but if you use it, it'll open the door to people copying music too, at least to certain extents.
Has disney EVER actually created somthing from scratch?
They have. To the best of my knowledge, excluding the music, Disney's original works, IN THE REALM OF FEATURE ANIMATION (I don't want to bother with the shorts or live action stuff) are:
Fantasia (Toccata & Fugue in D Minor; The Nutcracker Suite; Rite of Spring; Dance of the Hours; Night on Bald Mountain; Ave Maria) -- Saludos Amigos -- The Three Caballeros -- Make Mine Music -- Melody Time (Once Upon a Wintertime; Bumble Boogie; Little Toot; Blame it on the Samba; Blue Shadows on the Trail) -- The Aristocats -- A Goofy Movie -- Fantasia 2000 (Symphony No. 5; The Pines of Rome; Rhapsody in Blue; Carnival of the Animals; The Firebird Suite) -- The Emperor's New Groove -- Lilo & Stitch -- (The Lion King, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire, are disputed)
A number of the others were licensed (e.g. Winnie-the-Pooh, 101 Dalmatians) or were taken from public domain works which remain available to everyone (e.g. Snow White; Robin Hood)
Disney does some good stuff. Personally I really want Eldred to win so that I can start making new Mickey Mouse cartoons. He used to be a lot more fun way back in the early days.
Well, can I reasonably do as much with a compiled binary in the format that it is ordinarily sold, as I can with a book in the format that it is ordinarily sold?
Congress was given a copyright power when it was never envisioned that a work could somehow be harder to use, modify, or copy without permission (which is expected when the work falls out of term) than a book, or painting, or song, etc.
If a new class of works isn't as innately user-friendly in this sense as the classes of works known in 1789 were, then I submit that either a) the new class should not be eligible to be copyrighted, or b) should require supplementary information to be released with it to make up for its inherent deficit.
Otherwise, the public domain is not sufficiently compensated; the copyright will be unearned.
And note that source is NOT the same as a rough draft or manuscript. It IS the work, in the only form which it is reasonably able to be modified. A book that magically could not be copied would be just as ineligible for legal protection IMO.
Please note that what I am looking for is NOT open source in the GPL/BSD sense.
Rather, perhaps I should call it "Disclosed Source." It would be the right to own a copy of, read, and learn from source code in EXACTLY the same way as you could with a book. It would not include the right to use, modify, or copy it, except as permitted by fair use et al, again just as with a book. (until the copyright expired, whereupon anything could be done, again, just like a book)
With that essential defintion, let's proceed:
1) But copyright is founded on a policy that INTENDS for people to clearly have access to works and be able to reuse them for their own works. Thus, copyright should ONLY be granted for works that are not closed, because we a) want to discourage closed works, b) only will reward disclosed works.
2) This is inapplicable to my disclosed source proposal. People would NOT have the right to modify the software as a normal function of copyright. They could contract for that right, as with the GPL, or they could do so in a way that wasn't infringement (fair use, post-term modification). But while they might compete with you, it would not be any worse than as with any other class of copyrighted works.
What I'm basically saying is that Microsoft does NOT make the rules. The public needs to take a more active role in ensuring that copyright works for their benefit; it must never be harmful to them, no matter what authors might want. That would be to turn the world on its head.
It doesn't accord to the principles of copyright law, of the UCC, or even particularly to contract law. It's probably bunk, and it's utterly useless.
Sadly, there's been no serious test case. There is no willingness of developers to risk finding out that EULAs are garbage and that they've been outright selling software all this time, and too few purchasers that are otherwise acting in accordance with the copyright laws.
Personally, I have no respect for licensure that interferes with copyright policy. A license that grants me a right that I wouldn't have if I just bought the work, or which occurs in a transaction that is distinguishable from a mere sale of the work -- that's all I can see being acceptable.
Have you read the Softman case? It's not squarely on point, but it gets mighty close. Bobbs-Merril _is_ directly on point, OTOH, and comes out 100% against the licensor.
Software is no different than books, CDs, movies, or any other copyrighted work. It's not generally licensable.
That's a very odd wording of it then. 17 USC 106 lists copying and distribution seperately. And uses distribution, not redistrobution.
The 'Re-' sounds to me as though it is once again distributing a work already distributed. And First Sale tells us that authors only get to distribute a copy of a work the first time, not thereafter.
Well whoever the author of the plays was, let's just arbitrarily call him Shakespeare for the purposes of this discussion.
Anyway, would he be happy if someone else took Hamlet, recast it with lions and made an animated cartoon out of it without giving him a penny? No.
But if the work is not copyrighted, we don't really give a flying fuck what he thinks. He's unimportant. Copyright is designed for the benefit of the public; not the author.
Besides -- he can't have it both ways. Shakespeare's Hamlet is directly based upon an earlier play of Hamlet. The story is quite old and eventually is loosely based on real historical events hundreds of years earlier.
Shakespeare never had an original thought in his life. Why should he get to borrow from other people and no one get to borrow from him? In fact, since it is only the public that we care about, why should we care who borrows what, so long as in the end, we get the maximum possible number of works for free, to do with as we please?
If someone wants a copyright, then they should have to tell me, a member of the public, why I should give it to them. What's in it for me?
Yeah, I can support my program and charge money for that... but you can read my code, eventually learn it as well as I know it, then undercut me in the support service.
So? I can read novels written by a living author until I'm more well-versed in them than he is, then teach other people about them and how to interpret them. Literature teachers worldwide do this.
Writing a work doesn't entitle you to a monopoly on support regarding that work. Look at all the 3d party manuals and training available for Windows, a closed-source program.
Having closed-source code allows the programmer to sell you a copy, but allows him to charge everybody else who wants a copy as well so that he can multiply the price times the number of people willing to pay it.
NO. Copyright does this _MUCH_ better.
Firstly if you had a closed source uncopyrighted program, then any idiot could just make a copy of the binary they bought and resell it. Most people aren't interested in the source. And rare is the copy protection scheme that isn't broken.
On the other hand, if you had an open source copyrighted program, NO ONE can make copies of the source or the binary. The most that they can do is learn how you did things (just as we learn how an author writes by studying his books) and compete with you. Me, I like it when two people compete -- it means that they'll both have to strive to make a better product and charge me less money for it. Most people seem to share this view.
However, the competitor could NOT legally copy your work or use yours directly in a material way in making his own.
Furthermore, you get all the same advantages with regards to his code. And if either ever suspected the other was infringing, lawsuits would surely follow that would be aimed at driving the infringer out of the marketplace for his violation.
I'm not seeing a downside. All you've done is tell me why copyrights are good. You have failed to support an assertion of closed source software being good.
In a last thought, why is closed-source so bad? If your company spent 5 years and millions on researching an algorithm for X, I personally see no reason why can't make a bit of profit off it and keep it closed source as long as they don't play the patent/copyright/trademark game and take away everyone elses rights to anything similar.
That's why it is so bad. Also because that particular work is in itself valuable and should be released into the public while it is still useful. I mean, do you want Shakespeare's Hamlet, or a similar play written by some guy?
Closed source materials never reach the public at all. Even when the copyright expires, no one will ever have them. That stinks.
As for finding out when someone is using your code, unless what you're doing is very trivial, it's probably not that hard, and there are legal methods to find out _exactly_ what's going on if you have sufficiently strong suspicions.
While I agree that there is no moral obligation to release information, OTOH you must accept that there is no inherent right to prevent already-released information from being further used, modified, copied, and redistributed without your involvement or approval.
Any rights that the public at its whim graciously chooses to confer upon authors are intended PRECISELY to achieve that end result of totally removing the author from the finished work.
As for your ideal license, it's not bad, insofar as it extends powers to the licensee that he wouldn't normally have as a mere purchaser of the copyrighted work, BUT should include a clause that voids out the license without any loss of rights by the licensee when the copyright expires. (i.e. in 2098 or whenever when the copyright runs out, they don't get stuck with having to continue under this now rather pointless license OR having to cease their use of the work in order to get out from under it)
The court did NOT say that Pavlovich's posting wasn't actionable -- they said that he is not within the jurisdiction of the California courts. Pavlovich may yet have to go to court, just in a different state. Other people who post DeCSS may be within California's jurisdiction.
I started out writing the earlier post 'ultimate' and then realized the problem with the audio-ad hole. Thus, it was revised during composition.
While this would require your admitting that there are at least two people in the world who know the difference between those words, it's the truth. I really _did_ mean to do that.
Furthermore, even if I had not, do you claim that despite all the examples of the failings of the glasses alone that they are the ultimate form of filtering. Surely you cannot -- meaning that I would've used the proper word.
Often I find that when someone uses the correct word in a situation, that they meant it. Even applying Occam's Razor would seem to favor my position.
I know what penultimate means. And this is second-best. It doesn't filter out advertising delivered through other senses AT ALL. Sound ads will be a serious problem until They Live headphones are also introduced. Industries that use odors (perfumes, food, possibly bookstores) will survive even that.
Taste is kind of difficult to force on people. And I'm not entirely sure how well touch or orientation* could be employed in advertising.
So the ULTIMATE filtering technology is probably some sort of mecha that you sit inside, to insulate you. The glasses don't come close.
Surprising as it might seem, I very carefully and deliberately used 'penultimate' before. Some people do know what it means, dumbass.
*I.e. the Vestibulary sense -- your ability to sense which way is up or down, and the position of your limbs, etc. The major sense organs are in your inner ear.
The day everyone has TIVO, you'll see that the advertizements start to get buried INSIDE the show, or that that show you loved in no longer supported. All you can access for free will be propaganda supported stuff or pay-per-views. I'm nt looking worward to that day:)
This is why I want the penultimate filtering technology: the glasses from 'They Live,' rigged to filter out any advertising you happen to see, even in real life.
that will lead to fewer, higher-quality companies like google that can come up with ways to make ads *work*
No, I block those ads too.
IMO saying that one ad is better than another is like saying that it's okay to live under Franco, but not Mussolini. I think they're both pretty bad, and block 'em out accordingly.
Slashdot Mirror
That actually IS ownership. EULAs are not worth the paper they're printed on. Don't assume that they actually mean anything in the vast majority of cases.
The problem is however, you are being greedy.
I don't care if you don't want to release your source. That's fine. Enjoy.
But you have not earned a copyright on the binary in that case. Because the binary isn't as useful to the public (inclusive of all other developers) as the binary + source is. Or as a book, or a movie is.
Copyright was predicated on the assumption that all creative works would be as useful in their released form as a book, map, song, painting, etc. was back in 1789.
Software presently breaks that. Thus, because the public isn't benefitting as much as we expected to, we shouldn't be granting a copyright to you until you have earned it.
If a good portion of my site's readers start using blocking software, I could not afford to keep my site going the way it is now. And why, exactly, would that be a good thing?
Well, I hate all advertising, and I go to great lengths to block out as much as I possibly can. On the computer it's extremely rare for me to see any ads at this point. (maybe some spam in Pine, but I'm going to get the admin to upgrade to a newer version that will help me out a lot on that frong)
So, if I think it's a bad thing to see ads, and I think it's a bad thing to not see your site, on the whole, I'd probably rather not have the ads. Or at least they'd be equal, so asking me to give up one is certainly no great benefit for me.
I don't care if you stay in business. Lots of businesspeople fail every day. I liked Kozmo, and look what happened to them. Advertising may turn out to be a dumb way to run a business. If you fail to find a better alternative, then some competitor of yours assuredly will and will run you into the ground. It behooves you to try your damnest to appease customers.
Given how little benefit I derive from your getting ad revenue, even were I a regular reader of the site, I don't see why I should be shedding tears if you can't get it.
What's in it for me? You want ads because you want money -- you're not altruistic. Why should I be?
I disagree.
The sole objective of copyright is to promote the progress of the arts. This is best done by making sure that there are many works in the public domain, which may be used as is, copied, altered, and redistributed.
The method by which we accomplish this is to set up the copyright system, but it is just a means to an end.
However, compiled binaries cannot be meaningfully modified. And they run the risk of being unable to be used, copied, or redistributed if various copy protection measures are implemented.
If the public is not receiving that benefit from those works, then why should they be giving anything in exchange for them? Copyrights are only given, after all, in expectation for full rights to the entire work in the end.
Source is essentially the work. It's what's needed to make changes to (and maybe even copy or use) software without unreasonable amounts of effort demanded from the public.
As for contract -- you're just an idiot. Contract only effects people who have privity. If you write a program, and I obtain a copy of it WITHOUT signing your contract, and it's not copyrighted, you're just royally screwed.
Your position is as absurd as saying that we can use contracts to replace tort law or something. You really just don't understand how things work.
The two cases referenced are:
/. would seem to indicate ;)
Softman Prod. v. Adobe Sys., 171 F. Supp. 2d 1075 (C.D. Cal. 2001). Note the language on 1083-84, 1088, 1091. As the court notes, it doesn't reach the issue... but the message is clear.
Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Strauss, 210 U.S. 339 (1908).
The latter is noteworthy for creating the First Sale doctrine directly out of the copyright clause; it was not codified by Congress until the next year.
How is Villanova, incidentally? I'm across the river at Rutgers Law. (and not studying my ass off enough, as posting on
Not being the originator of something isn't enough to hang your argument on. Disney didn't originate the plots or characters in the vast majority of their movies, nor did they pay to use them. See, e.g. the just-now-being-released 'Treasure Planet,' based upon the R.L. Stevenson novel 'Treasure Island.'
Thus, they're gallavanting around with ill-gotten stories that weren't produced by them.
I have no problem with them doing that -- but if you're going to allow it, you'll have to find a different line of argument. There is one, but if you use it, it'll open the door to people copying music too, at least to certain extents.
They have. To the best of my knowledge, excluding the music, Disney's original works, IN THE REALM OF FEATURE ANIMATION (I don't want to bother with the shorts or live action stuff) are:
Fantasia (Toccata & Fugue in D Minor; The Nutcracker Suite; Rite of Spring; Dance of the Hours; Night on Bald Mountain; Ave Maria) -- Saludos Amigos -- The Three Caballeros -- Make Mine Music -- Melody Time (Once Upon a Wintertime; Bumble Boogie; Little Toot; Blame it on the Samba; Blue Shadows on the Trail) -- The Aristocats -- A Goofy Movie -- Fantasia 2000 (Symphony No. 5; The Pines of Rome; Rhapsody in Blue; Carnival of the Animals; The Firebird Suite) -- The Emperor's New Groove -- Lilo & Stitch -- (The Lion King, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire, are disputed)
A number of the others were licensed (e.g. Winnie-the-Pooh, 101 Dalmatians) or were taken from public domain works which remain available to everyone (e.g. Snow White; Robin Hood)
Disney does some good stuff. Personally I really want Eldred to win so that I can start making new Mickey Mouse cartoons. He used to be a lot more fun way back in the early days.
Ok, that's a fair claim. ;)
Well, can I reasonably do as much with a compiled binary in the format that it is ordinarily sold, as I can with a book in the format that it is ordinarily sold?
Congress was given a copyright power when it was never envisioned that a work could somehow be harder to use, modify, or copy without permission (which is expected when the work falls out of term) than a book, or painting, or song, etc.
If a new class of works isn't as innately user-friendly in this sense as the classes of works known in 1789 were, then I submit that either a) the new class should not be eligible to be copyrighted, or b) should require supplementary information to be released with it to make up for its inherent deficit.
Otherwise, the public domain is not sufficiently compensated; the copyright will be unearned.
And note that source is NOT the same as a rough draft or manuscript. It IS the work, in the only form which it is reasonably able to be modified. A book that magically could not be copied would be just as ineligible for legal protection IMO.
Please note that what I am looking for is NOT open source in the GPL/BSD sense.
Rather, perhaps I should call it "Disclosed Source." It would be the right to own a copy of, read, and learn from source code in EXACTLY the same way as you could with a book. It would not include the right to use, modify, or copy it, except as permitted by fair use et al, again just as with a book. (until the copyright expired, whereupon anything could be done, again, just like a book)
With that essential defintion, let's proceed:
1) But copyright is founded on a policy that INTENDS for people to clearly have access to works and be able to reuse them for their own works. Thus, copyright should ONLY be granted for works that are not closed, because we a) want to discourage closed works, b) only will reward disclosed works.
2) This is inapplicable to my disclosed source proposal. People would NOT have the right to modify the software as a normal function of copyright. They could contract for that right, as with the GPL, or they could do so in a way that wasn't infringement (fair use, post-term modification). But while they might compete with you, it would not be any worse than as with any other class of copyrighted works.
What I'm basically saying is that Microsoft does NOT make the rules. The public needs to take a more active role in ensuring that copyright works for their benefit; it must never be harmful to them, no matter what authors might want. That would be to turn the world on its head.
Only the licensing thing is baloney.
It doesn't accord to the principles of copyright law, of the UCC, or even particularly to contract law. It's probably bunk, and it's utterly useless.
Sadly, there's been no serious test case. There is no willingness of developers to risk finding out that EULAs are garbage and that they've been outright selling software all this time, and too few purchasers that are otherwise acting in accordance with the copyright laws.
Personally, I have no respect for licensure that interferes with copyright policy. A license that grants me a right that I wouldn't have if I just bought the work, or which occurs in a transaction that is distinguishable from a mere sale of the work -- that's all I can see being acceptable.
Have you read the Softman case? It's not squarely on point, but it gets mighty close. Bobbs-Merril _is_ directly on point, OTOH, and comes out 100% against the licensor.
Software is no different than books, CDs, movies, or any other copyrighted work. It's not generally licensable.
That's a very odd wording of it then. 17 USC 106 lists copying and distribution seperately. And uses distribution, not redistrobution.
The 'Re-' sounds to me as though it is once again distributing a work already distributed. And First Sale tells us that authors only get to distribute a copy of a work the first time, not thereafter.
Well whoever the author of the plays was, let's just arbitrarily call him Shakespeare for the purposes of this discussion.
Anyway, would he be happy if someone else took Hamlet, recast it with lions and made an animated cartoon out of it without giving him a penny? No.
But if the work is not copyrighted, we don't really give a flying fuck what he thinks. He's unimportant. Copyright is designed for the benefit of the public; not the author.
Besides -- he can't have it both ways. Shakespeare's Hamlet is directly based upon an earlier play of Hamlet. The story is quite old and eventually is loosely based on real historical events hundreds of years earlier.
Shakespeare never had an original thought in his life. Why should he get to borrow from other people and no one get to borrow from him? In fact, since it is only the public that we care about, why should we care who borrows what, so long as in the end, we get the maximum possible number of works for free, to do with as we please?
If someone wants a copyright, then they should have to tell me, a member of the public, why I should give it to them. What's in it for me?
Yeah, I can support my program and charge money for that... but you can read my code, eventually learn it as well as I know it, then undercut me in the support service.
So? I can read novels written by a living author until I'm more well-versed in them than he is, then teach other people about them and how to interpret them. Literature teachers worldwide do this.
Writing a work doesn't entitle you to a monopoly on support regarding that work. Look at all the 3d party manuals and training available for Windows, a closed-source program.
Having closed-source code allows the programmer to sell you a copy, but allows him to charge everybody else who wants a copy as well so that he can multiply the price times the number of people willing to pay it.
NO. Copyright does this _MUCH_ better.
Firstly if you had a closed source uncopyrighted program, then any idiot could just make a copy of the binary they bought and resell it. Most people aren't interested in the source. And rare is the copy protection scheme that isn't broken.
On the other hand, if you had an open source copyrighted program, NO ONE can make copies of the source or the binary. The most that they can do is learn how you did things (just as we learn how an author writes by studying his books) and compete with you. Me, I like it when two people compete -- it means that they'll both have to strive to make a better product and charge me less money for it. Most people seem to share this view.
However, the competitor could NOT legally copy your work or use yours directly in a material way in making his own.
Furthermore, you get all the same advantages with regards to his code. And if either ever suspected the other was infringing, lawsuits would surely follow that would be aimed at driving the infringer out of the marketplace for his violation.
I'm not seeing a downside. All you've done is tell me why copyrights are good. You have failed to support an assertion of closed source software being good.
It DOES give them redistribution rights, actually, under the First Sale doctrine. The same rule that lets you buy a book or CD, then sell it used.
It has to be the same copy as originally purchased, and you couldn't keep a copy of that for yourself, but it could be redistributed.
They may also be able to create a derivative work if it is sufficiently remote from the original, as well as make fair use of it, etc.
Sure they do. Then they can bill the client for the time ;)
In a last thought, why is closed-source so bad? If your company spent 5 years and millions on researching an algorithm for X, I personally see no reason why can't make a bit of profit off it and keep it closed source as long as they don't play the patent/copyright/trademark game and take away everyone elses rights to anything similar.
That's why it is so bad. Also because that particular work is in itself valuable and should be released into the public while it is still useful. I mean, do you want Shakespeare's Hamlet, or a similar play written by some guy?
Closed source materials never reach the public at all. Even when the copyright expires, no one will ever have them. That stinks.
As for finding out when someone is using your code, unless what you're doing is very trivial, it's probably not that hard, and there are legal methods to find out _exactly_ what's going on if you have sufficiently strong suspicions.
While I agree that there is no moral obligation to release information, OTOH you must accept that there is no inherent right to prevent already-released information from being further used, modified, copied, and redistributed without your involvement or approval.
Any rights that the public at its whim graciously chooses to confer upon authors are intended PRECISELY to achieve that end result of totally removing the author from the finished work.
As for your ideal license, it's not bad, insofar as it extends powers to the licensee that he wouldn't normally have as a mere purchaser of the copyrighted work, BUT should include a clause that voids out the license without any loss of rights by the licensee when the copyright expires. (i.e. in 2098 or whenever when the copyright runs out, they don't get stuck with having to continue under this now rather pointless license OR having to cease their use of the work in order to get out from under it)
The court did NOT say that Pavlovich's posting wasn't actionable -- they said that he is not within the jurisdiction of the California courts. Pavlovich may yet have to go to court, just in a different state. Other people who post DeCSS may be within California's jurisdiction.
But non-nerds (Muggles? ; )....
;)
The phrase you're looking for is 'normal people' or possibly 'normal, well-adjusted people.'
No, it's really not a save.
I started out writing the earlier post 'ultimate' and then realized the problem with the audio-ad hole. Thus, it was revised during composition.
While this would require your admitting that there are at least two people in the world who know the difference between those words, it's the truth. I really _did_ mean to do that.
Furthermore, even if I had not, do you claim that despite all the examples of the failings of the glasses alone that they are the ultimate form of filtering. Surely you cannot -- meaning that I would've used the proper word.
Often I find that when someone uses the correct word in a situation, that they meant it. Even applying Occam's Razor would seem to favor my position.
I know what penultimate means. And this is second-best. It doesn't filter out advertising delivered through other senses AT ALL. Sound ads will be a serious problem until They Live headphones are also introduced. Industries that use odors (perfumes, food, possibly bookstores) will survive even that.
Taste is kind of difficult to force on people. And I'm not entirely sure how well touch or orientation* could be employed in advertising.
So the ULTIMATE filtering technology is probably some sort of mecha that you sit inside, to insulate you. The glasses don't come close.
Surprising as it might seem, I very carefully and deliberately used 'penultimate' before. Some people do know what it means, dumbass.
*I.e. the Vestibulary sense -- your ability to sense which way is up or down, and the position of your limbs, etc. The major sense organs are in your inner ear.
I know. But surely the same basic technology can be adapted to what I propose.
OBEY
The day everyone has TIVO, you'll see that the advertizements start to get buried INSIDE the show, or that that show you loved in no longer supported. All you can access for free will be propaganda supported stuff or pay-per-views. I'm nt looking worward to that day :)
This is why I want the penultimate filtering technology: the glasses from 'They Live,' rigged to filter out any advertising you happen to see, even in real life.
My God -- they'd be glorious.
that will lead to fewer, higher-quality companies like google that can come up with ways to make ads *work*
No, I block those ads too.
IMO saying that one ad is better than another is like saying that it's okay to live under Franco, but not Mussolini. I think they're both pretty bad, and block 'em out accordingly.